Alan Gratz > Quotes

“You can live as a ghost, waiting for death to come, or you can dance.”
― Alan Gratz, Refugee

“All my life, I kept waiting for things to get better. For the bright promise of mañana. But a funny thing happened while I was waiting for the world to change, Chabele: It didn't. Because I didn't change it.”
― Alan Gratz, Refugee

“If I had known what the next six years of my life were going to be like, I would have eaten more. I wouldn't have complained about brushing my teeth, or taking a bath, or going to bed at eight o'clock every night. I would have played more. Laughed more. I would have hugged my parents and told them I loved them. But I was ten years old, and I had no idea of the nightmare that was to come. None of us did.”
― Alan Gratz, Prisoner B-3087

“If no one saw them, no one could help them. And maybe the world needed to see what was really happening here.”
― Alan Gratz, Refugee

“Life is but a river. It has no beginning, no middle, no end. All we are, all we are worth, is what we do while we float upon it — how we treat our fellow man.”
― Alan Gratz, Prisoner B-3087

“Head down, hoodie up, eyes on the ground. Be unimportant. Blend in.
Disappear.
That was how you avoided the bullies.”
― Alan Gratz, Refugee

“And that was the real truth of it, wasn't it? Whether you were visible or invisible, it was all about how other people reacted to you. Good and bad things happened either way. If you were invisible, bad people couldn't hurt you, that was true. But the good people couldn't help you, either. If you stayed invisible here, did everything you were supposed to and never made waves, you would disappear from the eyes and minds of all the good people out there who could help you get your life back. It was better to be visible. To stand up. To stand out.”
― Alan Gratz, Refugee

“I shook with helplessness and rage, but also with fear. This was what fighting back earned you. More abuse. More death. Half a dozen Jews would be murdered today because one man refused to die without a fight. To fight back was to die quickly and to take others with you.

This was why prisoners went meekly to their deaths. I had been so resolved to fight back, but I knew then that I wouldn't. To suffer quietly hurt only you. To suffer loudly, violently, angrily--to fight back--was to bring hurt and pain and death to others.”
― Alan Gratz, Prisoner B-3087

“Your parents, Oskar and Mina. They are dead and gone now, Yanek, and we would grieve them if we could. But we have only one purpose now: survive. Survive at all costs, Yanek. We cannot let these monsters tear us from the pages of the world.”
― Alan Gratz, Prisoner B-3087

“They only see us when we do something they don't want us to do, Mahmoud realized. The thought hit him like a lightning bolt. When they stayed where they were supposed to be - in the ruins of Aleppo or behind the fences of a refugee camp - people could forget about them. But when refugees did something they didn't want them to do - when they tried to cross the border into their country, or slept on the front stoops of their shops, or jumped in front of their cars, or prayed on the decks of their ferries - that's when people couldn't ignore them any longer.
Mahmoud's first instinct was to disappear below decks. To be invisible. Being invisible in Syria had kept him alive. But now Mahmoud began to wonder if being invisible in Europe might be the death of him and his family. If no one saw them, no one could help them. And maybe the world needed to see what was really happening here.”
― Alan Gratz, Refugee

“Good books shouldn’t be hidden away. They should be read by as many people as many times as possible.”
― Alan Gratz, Ban This Book

“It was all a big joke. I could see that now. There was no rhyme or reason to whether we lived or died. One day it might be the man next to you at roll call who is torn apart by dogs. The next day it might be you who is shot through the head. You could play the game perfectly and still lose, so why bother playing at all?”
― Alan Gratz, Prisoner B-3087

“But as she watched Lito and Papi lift up Ivan's body, the empty place inside got bigger and bigger, until she was more empty than full.”
― Alan Gratz, Refugee

“The ceremony was fast so we wouldn't be caught. When it was over, the men all whispered 'Mazel tov' and climbed back onto their shelves. I went up to the boy and pressed the wooden horse into his hands, the only present I could give him. The boy looked at me with big, round eyes. Had I ever been so young?

'We are alive,' I told him. 'We are alive, and that is all that matters. We cannot let them tear us from the pages of the world.'

I said it as much for me as for him. I said it in memory of Uncle Moshe, and my mother and father, and my aunts and other uncles and cousins. The Nazis had put me in a gas chamber. I had thought I was dead, but I was alive. I was a new man that day, just like the bar mitzvah boy. I was a new man, and I was going to survive.”
― Alan Gratz, Prisoner B-3087

“That’s what libraries were for: to make sure that everybody had the same access to the same books everyone else did.”
― Alan Gratz, Ban This Book

“I had survived the work gangs in the ghetto. Baked bread under cover of night. Hidden in a pigeon coop. Had a midnight bar mitzvah in the basement of an abandoned building. I had watched my parents be taken away to their deaths, had avoided Amon Goeth and his dogs, had survived the salt mines of Wieliczka and the sick games of Trzebinia. I had done so much to live, and now, here, the Nazis were going to take all that away with their furnace!

I started to cry, the first tears I had shed since Moshe died. Why had I worked so hard to survive if it was always going to end like this? If I had known, I wouldn't have bothered. I would have let them kill me back in the ghetto. It would have been easier that way. All that I had done was for nothing.”
― Alan Gratz, Prisoner B-3087

“And you wanted to escape,' a man near me whispered to another man. 'You wanted to run off into the woods and fight. But do you see? Do you see what the rest of them think about us? These people would sell you back to the Nazis for a sack of potatoes and then toast you at their dinner table.”
― Alan Gratz, Prisoner B-3087

“Fight against the impossible and win,”
― Alan Gratz, Refugee

“I had managed to scare even the monsters, and when you can scare monsters, you can be sure you've become one yourself.”
― Alan Gratz, Projekt 1065: A Novel of World War II

“Josef followed the small group of kids through the raised doorway onto the bridge of the St. Louis. The bridge was a narrow, curving room that stretched from one side of the ship to the other. Bright sunlight streamed in through two dozen windows, offering a panoramic view of the vast blue-green Atlantic and wispy white clouds. Throughout the wood-decked room were metal benches with maps and rulers on them, and the walls were dotted with mysterious gauges and meters made of shining brass.”
― Alan Gratz, Refugee

“It was easy to see the worst of humanity, when all I saw was brutality and selfishness, and these people showed me that there was still good in the world. Even if I rarely saw it.”
― Alan Gratz

“How do you explain to someone else why a thing matters to you if it doesn’t matter to them? How can you put into words how a book slips inside of you and becomes a part of you so much that your life feels empty without it?”
― Alan Gratz, Ban This Book

“You Americans think you can fix everything by throwing money at it,” she added. “But your friend was right. This is like the Stone Age. Because no one will let us get past the Stone Age. Not when there is nothing but war. Do you understand? The best thing you can do to help us is leave us alone.”
― Alan Gratz, Ground Zero

“You can live as a ghost, waiting for death to come, or you can dance.”
― Alan Gratz, Refugee

“Little Mariano was at home, getting fat”
― Alan Gratz, Refugee

“Being brave doesn't mean not being scared. It means overcoming your fear to do what you have to do.”
― Alan Gratz, Grenade

“That means letting them read books that are too easy for them, or too hard for them. That means letting them read books that challenge them, or do nothing but entertain them. And yes, it means letting students read books with things in them we might disagree with and letting them make up their own minds about things, which is downright scary sometimes. But that’s what good education is all about.”
― Alan Gratz, Ban This Book

“There were some horrors you couldn't fight and couldn't change. The real courage was just in enduring them.”
― Alan Gratz, Grenade

“And without a dream, without ambition, what point was there to living?”
― Alan Gratz, Ground Zero

“Mr. Pilkey smiled. “Well, I wish they were on the shelves, where everybody could read them,” he said. “I think it’s important that libraries be a place where you can find all kinds of books. Good ones, bad ones, funny ones, serious ones. Every person should be free to read whatever they want, whenever they want, and not have to explain to anyone else why we like it, or why we think it’s valuable. I hope you all get a chance to read my books someday.”
― Alan Gratz, Ban This Book